Charlie Brown Versus The Grinch

matt58clark
Dec 30, 2025
6 min read

By Matthew Clark

Christmas for many of us in Western lands is the most wonderful time of the year. We are told to be of good cheer and most of us, it would seem, take that directive to heart. Quality time with family and friends, rousing Christmas Carols, fine food, and religious worship make the Yuletide season very special.

Nevertheless even the happiest celebrators of Christmas admit that all is not perfect with how many of us observe this special occasion. Chief among the complaints by many, indeed perhaps a majority, is that Christmas has become too comercialized. It appears that business interests have commandeered the Holy day to promote their own temporal interests. This gripe has become so universal that most of the population in Christian lands accept it as a truth. Indeed it is a truth!

One of the more enjoyable features of Christmas is the many movies and animated television shows about the feast. Watching, and rewatching Christmas themed shows is a delightful experience of the season. Many of these Christmas specials have become classics. Two animated shows in particular have become celebrated by the public at large. Each of these animations have a theme protesting the commercialization of Christ's birth, and then offers an explanation of what makes Christmas special. These two specials are " A Charlie Brown Christmas," and "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas."

In "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" a creature, we are not sure exactly what species he is, lives in a cave in the Mountains above the village of Whoville. This creature, referred to as the "Grinch" hates Christmas due to it's commercialization. He resolves to cancel Christmas by breaking into every residence in 'Whoville' and confiscate all the 'Who's' presents. The Grinch succeeds beyond his wildest dreams. Scrambling back to his cave he puts an eager ear to the sky, hoping to hear the lamentations of the now impoverished Who's. Instead the air is filled with the sound of singing. Realizing that Christmas has come despite his efforts the Grinch ponders on what the true meaning of Christmas is. The Grinch deduces that Christmas is more than what comes in a store. Softened by this knowledge he returns all the gift's to the who's. They honour his conversion by letting him carve the Roast Beast at dinner.

Theodor Seuss Geisel ( Dr. Seuss) wrote "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" in a few weeks following an unfulfilling(for him) 1957 Christmas season. Up until that moment Geisel had experienced some challenging times. Born in 1904 he had seen Prohibition terminate his fathers career (dad was a brewer). He had lost a young sister, then experienced, like most of the world, the evils of Hitler and WWII. He and his wife Helen were childless. Helen was his best editor and a shrewd business editor. Nineteen fifty-seven saw her in poor health. It was in this climate that Dr. Seuss wrote "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas."

So what was the lesson learned by the Grinch on the true meaning of Christmas? It is that Christmas will endure as long as "We have We." As stated by writer Dan Olson in a November 9, 2018 article in Little Biblio, the moral of "The Grinch" is clear. The real meaning of Christmas is inside us. God is not involved. We are saved by we.

When the story was transformed into a cartoon in 1966 Geisel biographies called Grinch "a rare Christmas special without religiosity." Olson points out Geisel was an early trend setter. Christmas special with no Jesus!

By the time the cartoon aired on television Geisel was well on his way to tragedy. In 1962 he began an affair with Audrey Dimond, a long time friend. Helen, after trying to endure the humiliation of being spurned by her husband, committed suicide on October 23, 1967. Geisel showed his remorse, or lack of it, by marrying Audrey in August of 1968.

Over the years the "Grinch Who Stole Christmas" has become a wildly successful enterprise. Two movies have been made repeating the cartoon tale. "Christmas will be as long as we have we." So we are told. Yet what is Christmas is never answered in the Grinch! Nor what "we have we" means. "We have we" is sufficiently vague to mean anything the listener/reader/watcher wants it to mean. Perhaps that is what Dr. Seuss intended. Let Christmas mean anything you want it too. That way it can be perpetually celebrated. Except perhaps when it occurs to the millions of people honouring the Holy Day that they have nothing in common with the folks around them. They are all paying homage to Christmas for different reasons. Why therefore have the populace celebrate something so individualistic? Why be so public about our joy? Actually if it is so vague, so individualistic why have "we?' Is "we" that substantial that "we" should inconvenience ourselves every 25th of December the way "we" do?

Charles Schulz was a beloved cartoonist, children's author, and Sunday school teacher, who invented the 'Peanuts' cartoon featuring the hapless Charlie Brown. 'Peanuts' had such characters as the opionated Lucy, Linus with his blanket, and Pig Pen. Schulz had turned the cartoon into a favourite institution of American entertainment.

In 1965 the CBS television network hired Schulz and his partners Leo Mendelson and Bill Melendez to come up with a Charlie Brown Christmas special.

Together the trio came up with some novel strategies. They used real children to voice the cartoon characters. Most of the story was slow, focusing on Charlie Brown's search for the true meaning of Christmas, something which was complicated by his selection of a pathetic Christmas tree. All seems hopeless until the next to last scene in the episode, when Linus explains to Charlie Brown what Christmas means, by reciting from the gospel, Luke 2:8-14. At the conclusion of Linus recital the other characters in the special gather together and sing a rendition of "Hark the Harold Angels Sing."

When the executives from CBS viewed "A Charlie Brown Christmas" before it was aired in public they were disappointed to put it mildly. In their opinion it was a doomed project. If Coca Cola had not already bankrolled the project, and if it had not already been listed in TV Guide the episode would have been cancelled! Instead at 7:30p.m. on December 9, 1965 half of the television sets in America, 15 million in total, tuned in to watch the 'Peanuts' Christmas special.

To say the public was enthralled was/is an understatement. So were the critics. Lawrence Laurent (Washington Post) wrote: "Good old Charlie Brown, a natural born loser....finally turned up a winner.

Less than a year later the 'Peanuts' Christmas special would win an Emmy and Peabody award.

Mendelson and Melendez had voiced opposition when Schulz wrote in Linus scene quoting gospel to explain the true meaning of Christmas. Afterwards Mendelson would admit that segment made the entire project work. "That 10 year old kid recited that speech from the bible was as good as any scene from Hamlet."

So let's conclude this post with Linus famous quote from Luke. See if it measures up in substance to "Christmas will be as long as we have we."

"And there were in the same county shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the Angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you. Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." (Luke 2:8-14 KJV)